Eisner-nominated comic creators Julio Anta and Jacoby Salcedo join the Capes and Tights Podcast for Episode 186 on September 25, 2024. To prepare for the conversation, we have compiled four comics by Anta and Salcedo you should read.
Salcedo is a comic book illustrator based in Portland, Oregon. He is the co-creator of the Harper Collins YA graphic novel Frontera. He is also the artist on Dark Horse miniseries, It’s Only Teenage Wasteland with writer Curt Pires. Jacoby has also been featured in multiple comic anthologies such as DC’s Legion of Bloom, Panel X Panel, Graphic Mundi’s Covid Chronicles, and A Wave Blue World Young Men in Love.
Anta is an author of many graphic novels including Frontera, Home, Sí, Se Puede: The Latino Heroes Who Changed the United States and the upcoming This Land Is Our Land: A Blue Beetle Story along with Salcedo.
This Land is Our Land: A Blue Beetle Story hits bookstores everywhere on October 1, 2024 from DC Comics.
It’s Only Teenage Wasteland (Dark Horse) // Jacoby Salcedo
In the first days of the apocalypse, a group of high school boys may be the last alive in the city.
When his parents go out of town for the weekend, Mexican-American high schooler Javi decides to throw a party–one that’ll launch him and his buds into popularity! Or at least get them noticed by some girls. But no high school party goes off without a hitch. Javi can only watch as his friend takes a beating from the school bully, but then–BAM! The apocalypse has the worst timing. With few survivors–and even fewer sane ones–Javi and his friends will have to learn to survive together, and mend the fallout from the last party before the end of the world.
Home (Image) // Julio Anta
After being separated from his mother at the US border, a young Guatemalan immigrant must learn to harness his emerging superhuman abilities while being hunted by the Federal Government. Julio Anta & Anna Wieszczyk debut with a deeply grounded, and heartfelt graphic novel that explores the real world implications of a migrant with extraordinary powers.
Frontera (HarperAlley)
As long as he remembers to stay smart and keep his eyes open, Mateo knows that he can survive the trek across the Sonoran Desert that will take him from Mexico to the United States. That is until he’s caught by the Border Patrol only moments after sneaking across the fence in the dead of night. Escaping their clutches comes at a price, and lost in the desert without a guide or water, Mateo is ill-prepared for the unforgiving heat that is sure to arrive come sunrise. With the odds stacked against him, his one chance at survival may be putting his trust in something, or rather someone, that he isn’t even sure exists.
If you’d asked him if ghosts were real before he found himself face-to-face with one, Mateo wouldn’t have even considered it. But now, confronted with the nearly undeniable presence of Guillermo, he’s having second thoughts. As his journey stretches on, Mateo will have to decide exactly what and who he’s willing to sacrifice to find home.
This Land is Our Land: A Blue Beetle Story (DC)
Writer Julio Anta and artist Jacoby Salcedo, the dynamic team behind the young adult graphic novel Frontera, take readers on a gripping and inspiring journey filled with high stakes and heart as Jaime embraces his new calling as Blue Beetle!
Jaime Reyes is an ordinary high school student in El Paso, Texas, with a deep love for his family, culture, and home, and loves nothing more than his neighborhood’s spontaneous gatherings that go late into the night. But lately, he’s begun to realize that he and his border community are being used as pawns in an increasingly toxic immigration debate. The last few months have seen armed troops deployed along the U.S. and Mexico border, manufactured crackdowns at official border crossings, and a mounting resentment among a group of disaffected and reactionary youth.
Jaime’s problems get even more complicated when he finds an odd bug-like artifact while stargazing. He starts feeling a little different–like there’s another voice in his head pushing him toward his most base instincts. And to make matters worse, he’s been having surreal dreams that show him that the true threat El Paso faces isn’t illegal aliens but actual aliens known as the Reach. In fact, according to his dreams, Jaime is meant to pave the way for the Reach’s impending invasion!
